Unit of Ethology, Department of Biology, University of Pisa, Via Volta 6, Pisa, 56126, Italy.
Department of Life Sciences and Systems Biology, University of Turin, Turin, Italy.
Hum Nat. 2023 Mar;34(1):88-102. doi: 10.1007/s12110-023-09443-5. Epub 2023 Feb 21.
Humans are social animals that rely on different ways to interact with each other. The COVID-19 pandemic strongly changed our communication strategies. Because of the importance of direct contact for our species, we predict that immediately after the forced social isolation, people were more prone to engage in direct rather than in virtual interactions, thus showing a lower mimicry response in the use of smartphones. In a non-longitudinal study, we collected behavioral data under naturalistic contexts and directly compared the data of the mimicry response gathered immediately following the Italian lockdown (May-September 2020) with those gathered one year later (May-October 2021). Contrary to our expectations, the mimicry response in the use of smartphones was higher immediately after the lockdown than a year later. Probably the large use of these devices during the lockdown translated into a greater sensitivity to be affected by others' smartphone manipulation. Indeed, social isolation modified, at least in the short term, the ways we interact with others by making us more prone to engage in "virtual" social interactions. The bright side of the coin unveiled by our findings is that the effect seems to diminish over time. The large behavioral dataset analyzed here (1,608 events; 248 people) also revealed that the mimicry response in the use of smartphones was higher between familiar subjects than between strangers. In this view, mimicry in manipulating smartphones can be considered an example of joint action that fosters behavioral synchrony between individuals that, in the long-term, can translate into the formation of social bonding.
人类是依赖于不同方式相互交流的社交动物。COVID-19 大流行强烈改变了我们的交流策略。由于直接接触对我们物种的重要性，我们预测，在强制社交隔离之后，人们更倾向于进行直接的而不是虚拟的互动，因此在使用智能手机时表现出较低的模仿反应。在一项非纵向研究中，我们在自然环境下收集了行为数据，并直接比较了意大利封锁（2020 年 5 月至 9 月）后立即收集的数据与一年后（2021 年 5 月至 10 月）收集的数据。与我们的预期相反，封锁后立即使用智能手机的模仿反应高于一年后。可能是封锁期间这些设备的大量使用转化为对他人智能手机操作的更大敏感性。事实上，社交隔离至少在短期内改变了我们与他人互动的方式，使我们更倾向于进行“虚拟”社交互动。我们的研究结果揭示了一个积极的方面，即这种影响似乎随着时间的推移而减弱。这里分析的大型行为数据集（1608 个事件；248 人）还表明，在熟悉的受试者之间，使用智能手机的模仿反应高于陌生受试者之间。从这个角度来看，在操纵智能手机时的模仿可以被视为共同行动的一个例子，它促进了个体之间的行为同步，从长远来看，这可以转化为社会联系的形成。
